I sat at the entrance desk of the CCT tower. In front of me I had a book containing the notes on our opponents at the Vytal tournament, the same ones who right now were partying the night away.

The CCT tower foyer was a sparsely furnished room. Two doors connected the room to the outside, and in the middle of the wall, opposite of the entrance, a corridor continued further into the building. On both sides of the corridor there were two counters to accept people making long range calls. Ciel and I occupied one of the counters. The counter was outfitted with a desktop scroll, which was connected to the surveillance system of the tower. We had been outfitted with handheld radios, curtesy of the General.

Ciel had just left me to go to the toilet, while Copper was standing guard in the computer room. I saw him through the surveillance cameras. He was meditating in the center, the light from his flame covering the monitors around him in a bluish glow. Penny on the other hand I could not see on the cameras. According to our plan, she would right now be on the outside of the building, surveying the approach to the tower.

Ciel came back from the toilet and we returned to planning strategies against our opponents in the Vytal tournament.

Just as we were finishing up team JNPR from Beacon academy, we were interrupted by Penny's voice blurting out of the radio.

"Three figures approaching from the academy,"

"Do not engage, but stay on your toes," I answered.

"Staying on my toes will impede my balance..." Before she could continue debunking the figure of speech I muted the radio. "Ciel, I want you to ambush them if I can't talk them into leaving."

She acknowledged my order and further back the corridor to the central room of the tower, hiding just on the other side of the corner.

I spied the three figures as they sneaked closer to the entrance, they jumped from cover to cover in a faint attempt to be sneaky. Due to their speed I could not get a good look at them.

I readied my weapon in its sword form below the counter, and as the door opened I bellowed at the intruders. "Excuse me, no one's allowed in this area."

Without answering one of the intruders dashed forward, he had grey hair, and was, like the others, wearing a skin tight black combat suit and a mask. He attacked with a flying kick, and I only managed to block because I had already readied my defense. Using my sword as a springboard, he laid a little distance between us.

Ciel was alerted by the weirdly metallic clashing that emanated from our block and sent forward a torrent of electricity down the passage. This gave me a window to press the alarm button located below the counter.

As soon as the button was down the alarms went off. I grinned at the grey haired one, but as I did he sprang into action with a kick to my side. Again I managed to block it, and we delved into the fight.

Every kick delivered from my opponent were enchanted with bullets, creating an explosion every time his attacks met my blocks. His relentless attacks forced me on the defensive, every attack he made meet with the edge of my blade. But as the fight continued he slowly gained the advantage. With a kick into the ground he sent himself flying above me, and continued his attack with a downwards kick to my back. I used the force of the kick in a forward roll. As I rolled I felt like I was shortly blasted with cold water.

I quickly got up in a standing position and readied my sword to block the continued attacks of the grey haired. But instead I saw him running towards his green haired companion, who was sitting at the elevator to the top of the tower. The black haired one also disengaged with her fight with, but unlike me Ciel was distracted, shooting bolts lightning at invisible enemies.

I shot at the fleeing intruders, the grey haired on staggered as my bullets hit him in the back.

"Em! What the fuck?" He yelled.

"I don't know! He should still be deceived" The green haired intruder answered.

"Shut up both of you." The black haired intruder broke in, while throwing fire balls at me, forcing me to take cover on the side of the corridor. "We will discuss your failure back at the base, just get in the elevator."

"Ciel, snap out of it!" I yelled at the lightning infused as the intruders entered the elevator. I suddenly felt a wave of exhaustion flow over me. Green energy dissipated from around Ciel, and she stared confused at a point before her

"The elevator!" I yelled. Ciel reacted immediately and turned towards it, she fired out a bolt of lightning, but the door managed to close before it made contact.

I grabbed the radio and yelled into the transceiver. "They have breached the first line," I reported to Copper, "You only need to hold them off, Penny get down from the room and join Copper in the main communications room."

"Yes sir," They answered in unison, the sound of a wheezing flame accompanied Copper's answer, almost drowning out their response.

Again I muted the call, Ciel had closed in on the elevator and tried to call it down again. "They have destroyed the terminal on this side, we will not be able to call it down."

"The stairs, quickly." I ordered.

We were about halfway up the stairs when I saw cars from Vale police beginning to converge on the building. However, my view was suddenly blocked by a hot mass of molten glass that barreled towards the ground. The area around the tower was lit up like the day with light emanating from the top of the tower.

The computer room at the top of the tower was devastated. On one side the grey haired going blow for blow with Penny, a testament to his skill. On the other side there was an inferno of flames, the black haired intruder's clothes covered in intricate patterns of fire dust. Patches of her clothes were burned off, and she had embers in her hair. Copper was, unlike her, not damaged at all.

The two fire users fought by sending out balls of flames against each other, Copper sent out balls of pure blue against the woman. The pure flames burning a lot hotter than anything she could handle. On the other hand, her attacks were brushed off like water, none of them sticking to Copper as he slowly paced towards her through the inferno that was the computer room. Instead of continuing this futile test of wills, the woman manifested two swords from her fire. Copper accepted her invitation and drew his own sword.

As I entered, I felt like being soaked in cold water, and suddenly the green haired one appeared in the center of the room together with the main computer. The air around her was alive with her green aura.

I opened fire against her, she dogged, but the computer was demolished by my bullets and the green aura dissipated.

Noticing that they were at a disadvantage the intruders disengaged from their fights. The grey haired one used both of his feet to propel himself away from Penny and delivered a kick into the side of Copper, giving the black haired on time to retreat. They gathered by one of the broken windows where fire user created a bow like she had done her sword, with it she shot forth an arrow with a rope tied to it.

After attaching the rope to the tower, they proceeded to zip-line down the rope, their dark clad forms immediately becoming hard to see on the background of dark night.

We followed them down the zip-line, but as we were gliding towards the line went slack. One of the intruders had cut the line, making us barrel towards the ground.

The police on leveled their guns at us as we smashed into the ground, but were stopped by General Ironwood. "Don't, they are with us."

I nodded towards the General and set of in a sprint towards the place where the intruders had landed. The others from my squad following closely behind me.

As I closed, I saw their forms disappear into the academy. I continued following them through the ancient corridors of the academy. As I ran I heard music coming from the party which made me speed up further, I could not let them involve the students, Ozpin would have my hide!

I saw them enter a corridor leading directly to the dance party. The corridor was completely empty when I smashed the door open, the only thing revealing anyone had been there was the door in the opposite end closing, the crack between the double doors revealing the balloons and ribbons of the party. "Fuck," I sprinted the last couple of steps and smashed open the door. Instead of the panic as I had expected the party seemed to be going at a comfortable pace.

Nothing was out of place, well expect the guy in a dress, but that was no concern to the investigation. I slowly moved my eyes over the dancing students, none of them were wearing anything even resembling the black suits and mask of the intruders.

As I stood there and explored the area my team slowly caught up with me. "Monty damn that was fast," Copper managed to get out over his frantic gasping for air.

"We have lost them," I said, returning to the corridor. On the ground I found the masks of the intruders.

"We could try examining the partygoers for burns." Ciel recommended as she picked up the singed mask of the black haired intruder.

"Make it so," I said.

My team dispersed into the party, just as Penny was about to leave she was assaulted by Ruby. "Penny! You came!" She said as attacked Penny with a hug. The robot managed to remain standing, due to her car-stopping strength.

"Sorry Ruby I am here on the job, no time to lose." She said as she slowly undid the stranglehold Ruby had on her.

"Is there anything I could do to help?" Ruby asked timidly.

"As a matter of fact you can," I interrupted, "Have you seen anyone leave this corridor?" I pointed at the door behind me.

"No, sorry." She answered.

"What about anyone with burn marks, anyone come to mind?"

"No…" She looked very distraught that she had not noticed.

"It is probably that god damn illusionist." I concluded, "I need to talk to the General."

The area around the CCT tower was in lockdown. Both Vale police and the Atlesian platoon were present, dousing the fire created by the fight and cataloging the event. The General was coordinating the cleanup efforts.

"General!" I caught his attention.

"Corporal, what happened?" He asked.

"Three suspects attacked the CCT tower, they tried to gain access to the main computers."

"What happened to them? I see that you have not brought them back."

"We fought them off, however we could not catch them. They disappeared into the student body."

"Do you know what they wanted?"

"I do not know what their target was, but it had something to do with the main computer."

"I will have a computer specialist take a look at it."

The General left me, and began inspecting the interior of the tower as the rubble was cleared away. I was quickly joined by the rest of my team,

"No one we suspect seemed to have burn marks, the only ones we found where some who were burned after a being a little too intimate with a certain blonde of team RWBY" Copper reported.

"Damn it," I entered the CCT tower. Everything was like I had left it the notebook was still sprawled on the counter and the desktop scroll was still tuned to the security feed, "I believe that they are hiding in the student body," I began flipping through my notes, "I am sure that they are not in any of those I have looked through,"

I turned towards my team, "The thing is, I have only finished the easy ones. Team RWBY, team JNPR and team FNKI are all teams that we have a lot of data on since we know them. The other teams from Shade, Beacon and Haven are a lot more challenging, since the schools have done their utmost to hide both fighting style and semblances. We of course know the basics, like looks and names, but we will not get any information on them from the school."

I smashed the book against the table, "New mission soldiers, Penny, I want you to scout the scroll-net find their social media accounts, their position before they joined their hunter academy, anything." She quickly acknowledged my orders with a short salute and I moved on to Copper.

"Copper, you are visit the city and ask around. Have they gotten into fights? Hell, find out what their favorite drink is." He saluted me, but I wasn't finished, "Just remember we still have training in the morning, and if you come in with a hangover, I am sure a quick dip in the ocean will get rid of the worst." He smiled at the threat and gave a quick nod, still holding his salute.

"Our last task is for you Ciel. You will be observing the combat classes here at Beacon, try and identify any known faces, and study the fighting style of the participating students."

Ciel raised her hand to get a word in. "Sir, we are still banned from the school grounds right?"

"True, but when I was looking through the security cam channels, I found a small loophole." I lifted the screen up from the counter to face my team, "We aren't allowed to enter the academy, however:" after pushing a couple of buttons the screen displayed the Beacon battle arena which was currently devoid of any activity.

"Sadly we cannot watch recordings, so you have to be ready when they have combat classes."

"A question sir, before we go back to the ship." Ciel asked, "You did something during the attack."

"Yeah, it felt like you were doused in cold water?"

She nodded. "And the illusion I was fighting disappeared."

"Yep, it seems like I have discovered my semblance." I answered.

"Yay! I am so happy for you," Penny exclaimed, "What does it do?"

"I don't know what it does exactly, but it dispersed the illusion which the green haired one tried to cast." I said and looked up at the moon above us. ""It is time we get back to the ship, it's late, and we lot to do in the coming days."